Hunter Knights
by Mickee A. Renn
Summary: An aging Zero looks back on his life with Yuki, told mostly through flashbacks/one shots.


Disclaimer: I don't own Vampire Knight or any characters

A/N: This is the sequel to Vampire Knight: The Alternative Ending. That story, obviously, is my own ending to the Vampire Knight series and is available here on fanfiction. This story will thus contain many references to my own ending rather than Hino's, so I recommend you read that story before you begin to read this one. Expect it to be more highly influenced by the Anime vs. the Manga as well.

* * *

Kaname vowed to love Yuki until the end of time; however, as it were, he had already made that vow to another some centuries before. And so, having unintentionally spilt in his heart in two, his final act of love was to give half of his heart to each of them…

He threw the first half into the Parent Furnace. The other he intended to make that girl human again…

"But, someone else deserves it more," she said…

Kaname turned Zero Kiryu back into a human. And so, after a long battle of denying their feelings for one another, Zero and Yuki were finally able to be together.

Zero never regained his memories

* * *

"What…just happened?" One of the Hunters in the crowd that stood around the Parent Furnace murmured. Although Kaname Kuran had agreed to use his heart to restore the anti-vampire weapons, it was to everyone that he'd only fulfilled that promise half-way.

Zero lay unconscious in a clearing in the front row of the crowd. In the moments before Kaname's body turned to dust and floated up into the air, he'd carefully guide Zero's limp body to the ground.

Yuki had tears in her eyes all the while as she stood amongst the Hunters some feet away from the scene. Kaname had been kneeling over Zero only moments before. He had looked up to Yuki and uttered his dying words, "I will always be with you."

And then suddenly, he was just gone…

Yuki walked over to Zero and sat down next to him. She lifted the upper half of his body into her arms and began stroking his hair in attempt to wake him. It worked. His eyes fluttered open within the next few minutes.

"How do you feel?" Yuki asked.

"Weird, somehow," he grunted. "What happened anyways? Why did I suddenly pass out?"

"Kaname turned back into a human," Yuki stated.

"He what?" Zero gasped and jerked himself upright. He clutched his neck then and whispered, "My throat doesn't burn anymore."

Zero placed the tips of middle and index finger on the part of Yuki's jaw right below her ear. He ran them diagonally down her neck.

He told her sometime later that all he could think about was how he'd never be able to touch the deepest part of her soul again. She told him she'd felt much the same thing the day she'd finally became human again, too.

When a vampire drinks the blood of their beloved, they not only see their thoughts and feel their emotions, but because of all that, they in essence, become their beloved.

And so when two vampire lovers simultaneously drink one another's blood, all boundaries are lost and they truly become as one.

That's something Zero and Yuki though they'd never have again…

* * *

_This the final will and testimony of I, Kaien Cross: I leave all my assets to my daughter, Yuki, and her fiancé, Zero Kiryu. May they welcome my grandchild into the world by bringing him or her into our loving home._

* * *

The hunters dispersed when Toga Yaguri announced that it was time to prepare to receive the new weapons. As they went to attend to their respective duties, Yaguri and Yuki meanwhile helped Zero get to a bed in the Association's bunker. Yaguri left them alone after that, as he had his own business to attend to.

Instead of lying down, Zero just sat on the bed deep in thought. His elbows rested on his thighs. His hands were fold between his knees. Yuki silently sat down next to him and placed her hands on his hands.

"So that's it? You make me wait a whole year and a half out of respect for Kaname…and now, only minutes after he's gone, you're just suddenly all ready to pick up where we left off?" Zero questioned.

"I'm sorry," Yuki whispered as she pulled her hands away. "I just thought you might need someone right now. It just so much to through and so unexpected that—

Zero unfolded his hands and clutched Yuki's before she could pull them away any further. He looked her in the eye then and said, "I made the mistake of letting you slip through my fingers again and again. I won't do it this time."  
"Are you saying you finally remembered something?" Yuki cried. Her face scrunched up when he shook his head. He was still stuck living with the stories Yuki had told him and the images he'd seen every time he drank her blood since the time she'd finally confessed to her sin.

"I'm so sorry, Zero," Yuki whispered.

"Stop apologizing, Yuki," Zero grunted as he ruffled her hair. "That was a long time ago."

He leaned in and kissed her for the first time since before the day she learned that she was the biological daughter of Kaien Cross.

* * *

"Okay, kids, why don't you go play outside?" Yuki shuffled their 3 children out the door to keep from seeing the argument she and Zero were about to have. Zero was leaning up against a wall in hallway, starting out a window.

"Okay, Zero, what is it?" Yuki demanded. "You've been acting moody for days now!"

"Don't you realize it's been almost ten years?" Zero asked.

"Ten years since what?" Yuki wondered.

"What do you think?" He snapped and spun around to look at Yuki. "It's been almost ten years since you erased my memories and I still can't remember a thing!"

"I…I thought you said you were okay with all that…" I murmured.

"Yeah, well, maybe I lied," he grunted. He stormed into their bedroom then and slammed the door behind him.

* * *

_Yes, go on, Yuki. Let yourself guiltlessly love again. You don't have to worry about me anymore…_

_ Ka-Kaname?_

Yuki jerked away from Zero upon hearing Kaname's voice slither softly into her mind.

"What?" Did something scare you?" Zero asked.

"I thought I," Yuki choked. She closed her eyes and shook her head. "No, it couldn't have been."

She started kiss him again, but that time he hesitated.

"Zero…?"

"It's Ichiru," Zero confessed. "He's still haunting me…and trying to drive us apart."

_Don't worry, Yuki. I won't allow that to happen._

_ Kaname, how am I …how am I hearing your voice right now?_

* * *

Two nearly invisible souls stood standing somewhere between the edges of life and death…

"Ichiru Kiryu."

"Kaname Kuran, what an unpleasant surprise."  
"I need you to stop torturing Zero right now, Ichiru."  
"I don't see it as torture. I see it as a pep talk" Ichiru said. "Besides, there's nothing you can do about it!"

"It's time to go, Ichiru. You can't cling to this existence forever. It's not good for you or for Zero."

"What are going to do about it? Neither of us even have bodies anymore!" Ichiru shouted.

"Then I suppose you and I will just have to keep talking like this…forever…"


End file.
